Filemon Vela - Representing the 34 District of Texashttps://vela.house.gov/rss.xml
enRep. Vela Announces Passage of H.R. 4578, the Counter Terrorist Network Acthttps://vela.house.gov/media-center/press-releases/rep-vela-announces-passage-hr-4578-counter-terrorist-network-act
<h2 align="center"><strong>Rep. Vela Announces Passage of H.R. 4578, the Counter Terrorist</strong></h2>
<h2 align="center"><strong>Network Act</strong></h2>
<p><strong><em>Washington, DC</em></strong> - Congressman Filemon Vela (D-TX), Ranking Member of the Border and Maritime Subcommittee, announced today that his bipartisan bill, the Counter Terrorist Network Act (H.R. 4578), passed the House of Representatives with overwhelming support by a vote of 410-2.</p>
<p>The Counter Terrorist Network Act seeks to ensure that U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s (CBP) National Targeting Center is positioned to continue embedding its analysts in overseas operations so that individuals associated with terrorist and transnational criminal networks are prevented from operating with impunity. The bill authorizes the National Targeting Center to continue building its collaborative intelligence and law enforcement partnerships to stay one step ahead of those individuals who wish to do us harm or commit other criminal acts. H.R. 4578 also authorizes CBP personnel to be posted abroad to perform critical preemptive operations to ensure the travelers and visa petitioners coming to our country are thoroughly screened and vetted.</p>
<p>“It is imperative for the Department of Homeland Security and its law enforcement partners to do everything practicable to screen and vet individuals before they arrive at our borders,” said Rep. Vela. “This measure is a product of bipartisan work that strengthens CBP’s ability to facilitate legitimate trade and travel. I look forward to working with my colleagues in Congress to get this bill passed in the Senate.”</p>
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<p> </p>Thu, 11 Jan 2018 12:00:00 -0500230https://vela.house.gov/media-center/press-releases/rep-vela-announces-passage-hr-4578-counter-terrorist-network-actRep. Vela Urges Democratic Senate Leadership to Consider Environmental Impact of Border Wallhttps://vela.house.gov/media-center/press-releases/rep-vela-urges-democratic-senate-leadership-consider-environmental
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<h3 align="center"><strong>Rep. Vela Urges Democratic Senate Leadership to Consider Environmental Impact of Border Wall</strong></h3>
<p><strong><em>Washington. D.C.</em></strong> - Representative Filemon Vela, Ranking Member of the Border and Maritime Subcommittee, led a letter to Senate Minority Leader Schumer and Senate Minority Whip Durbin following reports of ongoing border security negotiations with the White House. The letter urges Senate leaders to consider the environmental impacts of the proposed border wall before reaching any final decision on border wall funding. The Ranking Member of the House Committee on Homeland Security, Representative Bennie Thompson, and the Ranking Member of the House Natural Resources Committee, Representative Raul Grijalva, joined in sending the letter.</p>
<p>“Protected lands, like the Santa Ana National Wildlife Refuge, must be preserved for future generations,” said Rep. Vela (D-TX). “The reckless border wall, designed to satisfy a nationalist agenda, and little else, will have damaging impacts on the ecosystems and wildlife of the border and on its accessibility. As leadership continues to negotiate provisions that will have a lasting impact on border security, they must not forget the border wall’s impact on Texas’ ecosystems and on its people.</p>
<p>Ranking Member Thompson added, "It is imperative that Congressional leaders consider the impact of border wall construction on the environment and wildlife. Any border security decisions made today could damage precious ecosystems along the Southwest border for generations. President Trump's border wall would be a completely unnecessary boondoggle and our environment should not be sacrificed for it."</p>
<p>“The border wall is not a bargaining chip, it’s a catastrophe. Anyone who bases their immigration policy on destroying entire ecosystems has no idea how the world works. The American people have lost their patience with President Trump’s ridiculous demands and lack of basic policy knowledge. This border wall fantasy is unpopular. It’s time for it to end,” said Rep. Grijalva (D-AZ).</p>
<p>To view the letter, <a href="https://vela.house.gov/letter-schumer-and-durbin">click here</a>. </p>
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<p> </p>Mon, 08 Jan 2018 12:00:00 -0500230https://vela.house.gov/media-center/press-releases/rep-vela-urges-democratic-senate-leadership-consider-environmentalRep. Vela Pushes for Clean Dream Acthttps://vela.house.gov/media-center/press-releases/rep-vela-pushes-clean-dream-act
<p>Washington, DC—Today, Rep. Filemon Vela (D-Texas) released the following statement regarding a clean up or down vote on the Dream Act by the end of 2017:</p>
<p>“A vote for a Continuing Resolution without a clean Dream Act is a vote against Dreamers. And rest assured, under no circumstances will I vote for a bill that provides a penny for border wall funding.” </p>
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<p class="align-center"><span>###</span></p>Mon, 18 Dec 2017 00:00:00 -0500212https://vela.house.gov/media-center/press-releases/rep-vela-pushes-clean-dream-actVela Releases Statement Following the Passage of Republican Tax Cuthttps://vela.house.gov/media-center/press-releases/vela-releases-statement-following-passage-republican-tax-cut
<p><strong>Washington, DC – </strong><em>Representative Filemon Vela (D-Brownsville) released the following statement following the passage of H.R. 1, the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act</em><strong>:</strong></p>
<p>“Today, I stood against the Republican tax cut bill for corporations and the wealthiest in our nation. Supporters claimed that the bill would reform the tax system and provide significant tax relief for the middle class. The reality is that the small tax cuts for individuals are paired with the loss of many important tax provisions for working families including those that promote home ownership. Millions of American families will see their taxes go up – not down – if the Republican tax plan is signed into law. Adding to the imbalance of the bill toward corporate interests, the tax cuts for businesses would be permanently added to the tax code while reductions in tax rates for individual taxpayers are temporary. In their rush to provide a win for the embattled President, Congressional Republicans rammed through a tax cut bill that will increase our national debt, leaving a terrible legacy for our children and grandchildren. I cast my vote against the Republican tax bill on behalf of South Texas working families.”</p>
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<p align="center">###</p>Thu, 16 Nov 2017 00:00:00 -0500212https://vela.house.gov/media-center/press-releases/vela-releases-statement-following-passage-republican-tax-cutHow Hurricane Harvey-Related Emergency Funding Could Help Port Mansfieldhttps://vela.house.gov/media-center/in-the-news/how-hurricane-harvey-related-emergency-funding-could-help-port-mansfield
<p>PORT MANSFIELD, RGV – Ron Mills, port director for Willacy County Navigation District, has thanked Governor Greg Abbott, U.S. Sen. John Cornyn and U.S. Rep. Filemon Vela for pushing to get more funding for the U.S. Corps of Engineers.</p>
<p>If their funding requests are successful, the Corps would have the money to help renovate Texas ports damaged by Hurricane Harvey, including Port Mansfield.</p>
<p>“In our case, it could be a three-way win – for ourselves, the Town of South Padre Island, and the National Seashore at South Padre Island,” explained Mills. “The Mansfield Cut all the way to the harbor itself is in a pretty bad condition. About half of our channel has gotten down to about two, three or four feet deep. We need our channel dredged and both South Padre Island and the National Seashore could do with the sand and silt we dredge out.”</p>
<p>Port Mansfield suffered the first casualty on mainland USA when Hurricane Harvey roared in. The Gulf Princess, a dive and research vessel that took welders out into the Gulf of Mexico to weld underwater pipelines, ran aground at Port Mansfield as it tried to find safe harbor during the Category 4 storm.</p>
<p>“Since Hurricane Harvey, the Governor has written letters to the Corps of Engineers in Washington, D.C. Congressman Vela has also reached out for emergency funding. I have met with Senator Cornyn’s staff on two occasions. I want to thank them for their help,” Mills said.</p>
<p>“We know there are funds out there for the Corps to tap into due to the storms. Understandably, though, the federal government has spent a billion dollars in Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands and however much they have spent in Florida. But, our whole project, according to the Corps’ own numbers to dredge from the Gulf of Mexico to the harbor is $9.8 million. It seems a lot of money when you talk local budgets – Willacy County does not have $9.8 million in the whole county – but when it comes to a port, it is a small sum of money. If we just do the entrance to our harbor, I need about $350,000.”</p>
<p><img alt="" class="size-full wp-image-5625 td-animation-stack-type0-2" height="260" sizes=" 640px) 100vw, 640px" src="https://i1.wp.com/riograndeguardian.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/mills_ronald_3.jpg?resize=640%2C344" srcset="https://i1.wp.com/riograndeguardian.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/mills_ronald_3.jpg?w=680 680w, https://i1.wp.com/riograndeguardian.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/mills_ronald_3.jpg?resize=300%2C161 300w" width="484" /><span> Ronald Mills, port director for Willacy County Navigation District.</span></p>
<p>Mills said he believes there is emergency funding available due to the recent hurricanes.</p>
<p>“If the Corps declares it an emergency, they do the work and I do not have to do the work. If I have to do the work, there is a permitting process that I have already entered it. That could take up to a year. But if the Corps steps in, they could just do it tomorrow. And they take care of it because it is their project.</p>
<p>Mills points out that all the Texas sea ports north of Port of Mansfield were affected by Hurricane Harvey.</p>
<p>“We had two issues. One, a ship running aground in no longer navigable waters. And the second was that our harbor shoaled up significantly more than it was. We already had a problem. When Harvey came in it pushed in the water but as it passed us it created a vacuum. As you saw in some of the footage in Florida, how the bays emptied out before the storm arrived, well we had the same effect but on the back side of the storm. It sucked all the water out of the Laguna Madre, which is incredibly shallow, and it piled up puddles of sand and it made our harbor worse than it was.”</p>
<p>Mills said as things stand Port Mansfield has no commercial traffic to speak of. “We have no barges and even the larger shrimp boats cannot get in. The 30-foot boats cannot get out any more.” Asked if the Port’s revenues had been affected by Hurricane Harvey, Mills said: “We will not see it now, but end of next Spring we will see it.”</p>
<p>The last time the Corps of Engineers dredged the ship channel at Port Mansfield was in 2015. “They did it for about $280,000. We may be shallower now.”</p>
<h3><strong>The Coast Pilot</strong></h3>
<p>Mills spoke in depth about the Gulf Princess running aground and why it should never have happened.</p>
<p>“I argued from the first day I met the Corps of Engineers that Port Mansfield is a safe haven. It is a place where mariners would run to in a storm. The Coast Guard on South Padre Island, which I used to be stationed at, had it in their standard orders that you would go either to the turning basin at Brownsville harbor or Port Mansfield for safety if a storm came. The Corps has always argued that is not true. The scenario that led up to the ship’s grounding was this: the captain is offshore, Harvey literally produces itself overnight. We went to bed with a tropical wave and woke up with a hurricane. The captain was trapped in open waters in the Gulf and he was running for safety. He had two choices. He could either drive directly into the storm to go to Brownsville, or he could have headed away from the storm and try to make it to Corpus Christi. Had he done that the storm would have overtaken him and that would probably have been worse for him. So, what did he do as a prudent mariner? There is a thing called the Coast Pilot. He looked in the Coast Pilot and said, oh, look, there is an opening right there in Port Mansfield. The Coast Pilot has not been updated since the 1980s. Back in the 1980s and 1990s, Port Mansfield was a port that offshore supply vessels for rigs came out of. The Coast Pilot says this port is used by offshore supply vessels. As a prudent mariner he went into Port Mansfield thinking he was going to find safe water. He went through the center of the channel. The range markers are still in place, established and still maintained by the Coast Guard. He ran the range markers and a third of the way into the channel he ran aground. But on paper it is a navigable water way.”</p>
<p>The Princess Gulf was stuck at Port Mansfield for 18 days. An outside firm out of Louisiana pulled the vessel out and eventually re-floated it. The company’s rescue team pushed the vessel up against a grounded barge and used that as a working platform. They repaired the holes the Princess Gulf had in the hull, took the water out and took it to Louisiana to be repaired.</p>
<h3><strong>Possible Consumers</strong></h3>
<hr /><p>Mills explained why both the National Seashore at South Padre Island and the Town of South Padre Island could do with any sand and silt dredged from Port Mansfield.</p>
<p>“There are two consumers of the product that are very interested in it. One is South Padre Island. I had been informed they were going to use the debris from the Brownsville Ship Channel when they take it to 52 feet in their big project. But, apparently, that is not the type of material they need. It is not really beach material. They are very interested in the fact that we are using or have these millions of yards of material that needs to be moved. They have shown, recently, an interest in it,” Mills said.</p>
<p>Mills said that after the Port Mansfield ship channel is dredged, the sand and silt would be pumped onto barges and transported to South Padre Island. “They would pump it either directly down to the beaches that need reinforcing, or they would dump it into the open Gulf and let nature settle it back onto the beach. Either way it works for me. It is out of my way.”</p>
<p>Mills said the second request he received for the dredged material is the National Seashore.</p>
<p>“The National Seashore has two big concerns. One is the seashore itself, where in six or ten places, the wash throughs have come through the Island to the Gulf. This is big problem for them because they are losing their national park. The second is the north jetty, the Port Mansfield Cut, which is the southern boundary of the National Park. It has been eroded away so much it is further back than the rocks on the jetty themselves. Any good storm that came directly in could potentially wash through and they could lose the southern boundary of the national park. So, they are very interested.”</p>
<p>Mills said the National Parks Service has been negotiating nationally for all the National Seashores of the United States with the Army Corps of Engineers to help them with beach revitalization. “So, they are very interested in having the silt and sand that is in our channel pumped into open water or directly onto the beach to fix their jetty problem and/or the beach erosion problem. This would save me a disposal cost. Somebody else gets rid of it, I just get it out of my way.”</p>
<p>Mills said there is enough material there to make South Padre and the National Parks Service happy.</p>
<p>“It is the width of the channel, which is several hundred yards wide, and probably two miles long for the initial area that needs to be dredged. That is just the Mansfield Cut. Then there is a shoal which is about half a mile further in. That blocks off the channel completely and that is only three feet deep, and it is not just soft silt, it is actually hard beach type sand,” Mills said.</p>
<p>“And then the harbor itself, we have probably 30,000 maybe 40,000 yards of material that is blocking the harbor into Port Mansfield. So, we have lot spots that have a lot of sand. But, it is definitely many millions of yards of sand that are available to be moved.”</p>
<p><em>Editor’s Note: The main image accompanying the above story shows the Princess Gulf at Port Mansfield. Photo is courtesy of Texas A&amp;M University-Corpus Christi.</em></p>Fri, 27 Oct 2017 00:00:00 -0400212https://vela.house.gov/media-center/in-the-news/how-hurricane-harvey-related-emergency-funding-could-help-port-mansfieldLRGVDC to Launch Interactive Explore RGV Mobile App and Websitehttps://vela.house.gov/media-center/in-the-news/lrgvdc-launch-interactive-explore-rgv-mobile-app-and-website
<p>WESLACO, RGV – The Lower Rio Grande Development Council, the official council of government for Cameron, Hidalgo and Willacy counties, has secured a grant to market the region.</p>
<p>The U.S. Economic Development Administration (EDA) has awarded a $350,000 investment to the LRGVDC for the development of its “Explore Rio Grande Valley” marketing program and mobile application. With matching funds from LRGVDC, the total project is worth $500,000.”</p>
<p>“We are really excited to get this award,” said LRGVDC Executive Director Ron Garza, at a board of directors’ meeting on Wednesday. “We are dubbing this Explore RGV. It will serve as the region’s marketing platform. It is kind of a departure from our core services. But, we are going to bring in a lot of key stakeholders.”</p>
<p><img alt="" class="size-full wp-image-110567 td-animation-stack-type0-1" height="255" src="https://i0.wp.com/riograndeguardian.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/170803-garza.jpg?resize=184%2C255" width="184" /><span> Ron Garza</span></p>
<p>Garza said the project came about following discussions at the Large Cities Coalition. This group is administered by LRGVDC. Garza said the Valley’s large cities expressed an interest in marketing the region. He said the cities were all set to create a budget and fund the project but held off while Garza investigated if any grants were available. Luckily, he said, there were.</p>
<p>Garza said the first phase of the project will be to create “a comprehensive asset map of the Valley’s treasures.” By way of an example, he said the region’s world birding centers would be included but not, at this stage, hotels or restaurants. Once the asset map is completed the destinations identified will categorized. “We are then going to engage all our chambers, convention and visitors’ bureaus, we want to make sure we do not miss anything,” Garza said.</p>
<p>The last phase, Garza said, is to build a base platform website. “But, the real key to this is to do an interactive mobile app so that visitors to the Valley, either by category or by map or by their fixed location, can see where they are at in the Valley and see what destinations are around them.”</p>
<p>Users of the app will be able to get different suggestions, depending on how long they are staying in the region. “We hope then to have some regional signage,” Garza said. “Once we have this platform, cities can invest their own dollars and market their city, but this could be the tag to create the platform.”</p>
<p>As for the timeframe, Garza said: “We are going to push quick on this so that hopefully, within a year we will have this mobile app.”</p>
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<div>Garza added: “Usually, people Google either the Island or McAllen and develop their itinerary from there. We want to give them a one-stop shop so they can formulate their own. Not only are we trying to increase tourism with visitors coming down to the Valley, we want to educate folks that have lived here all their lives but do not know such and such a destination existed. We hear people say, we are the best kept secret, that is not a good business model.”</div>
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<p>Congressmen Filemon Vela, Henry Cuellar, and Vicente Gonzalez have expressed their support for the Explore Rio Grande Valley marketing program and mobile application. They said the project will help create a national and international brand that will enhance tourism across the region. And they believe the EDA’s $350,000, along with local matching funds, will help create 25 new jobs in the region, pointing out that the LRGVDC will match the EDA grant with $150,000 in in-kind and matching funds for a total investment of $500,000.</p>
<p>“I am excited the creation of ‘Explore Rio Grande Valley’ will showcase all of the rich history and beauty of South Texas. I would like to thank the EDA for providing the LRGVDC with this wonderful opportunity,” Vela said.</p>
<p>“The secret is out. The Rio Grande Valley is one of the most beautiful destinations in the State of Texas. With this investment, the rest of the country will finally realize what us South Texas residents have known all along. I am especially pleased to hear about the anticipated creation of 25 jobs. I thank the Economic Development Administration for awarding this prestigious grant to the Lower Rio Grande Valley Development Council and look forward to continuing this partnership in the future,” Cuellar said.</p>
<p>“The Rio Grande Valley is a vibrant and growing region rich in culture and natural resources. With this grant we will have the opportunity to share our diverse communities and traditions with the rest of the nation and we will continue to thrive. Thank you to the U.S. Economic Development Administration for investing in the Rio Grande Valley and recognizing our enormous potential and all that our area has to offer this country,” Gonzalez said.</p>
<p>The comments of the three members of Congress were contained in a news release that also stated:</p>
<p>“The U.S. Economic Development Administration (EDA) is a bureau within the U.S. Department of Commerce that provides grants and technical assistance to communities in order to generate new employment, help retain existing jobs and stimulate industrial and commercial growth through a variety of investment programs. The “Explore Rio Grande Valley” investment is projected to help the Rio Grande Valley create strategies to strengthen the region’s agriculture and aquaculture assets while also promoting economic and human capital development.”</p>
<p>LRGVDC’s Garza said in the news release: “We are thrilled that have the opportunity to facilitate this collaborative regional project with all our partners and stakeholders that will create a universal marketing platform to highlight our region’s vast natural assets and attractions. We’d like to thank EDA for their continuous support and economic investment into the Lower Rio Grande Valley.”</p>Thu, 26 Oct 2017 00:00:00 -0400212https://vela.house.gov/media-center/in-the-news/lrgvdc-launch-interactive-explore-rgv-mobile-app-and-websiteEDITORIAL: Renaming Border Checkpoint After Fallen Agent is Deserved honorhttps://vela.house.gov/media-center/in-the-news/editorial-renaming-border-checkpoint-after-fallen-agent-deserved-honor
<p>The naming of a border patrol checkpoint in recognition of a U.S. Borden Patrol agent who was killed in the field by criminals who were in this country illegally is absolutely the right message our country should be delivering right now when it comes to immigration issues.</p>
<p>Both Presidents Barack Obama and Donald Trump have pledged during their tenure to eliminate those with criminal backgrounds who are in the United States illegally. Rightfully, those people should be a priority for deportation.</p>
<p>Commemorating a heroic officer who gave his life fighting against criminal elements is most worthy of our respect and praise.</p>
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<div data-refreshable="true" data-region="fixed-big-ad-top-asset">We encourage, and frankly we expect, President Trump to sign into law a bill that the U.S. House passed on Tuesday evening to rename the Border Patrol checkpoint in Sarita on U.S. Highway 77 North in honor of U.S. Border Patrol Agent Javier Vega Jr., who was killed in 2014 by two undocumented immigrants who had both been arrested and deported multiple times.</div>
<p>Officials say Vega was shot when the two men tried to rob him while he was off duty fishing in Raymondville with his family. His father also was shot and his young children witnessed the event.</p>
<p>The renaming of the Sarita checkpoint after him would send a strong message of support for law enforcement agents, who we have long held are the key to the front line in our country’s immigration struggle.</p>
<p>Vega, 36, was a native of La Feria and a veteran who served in the U.S. Marine Corps. He worked at the Sarita checkpoint as a canine handler with his dog, Goldie.</p>
<p>U.S. Rep. Filemon Vela, D-Brownsville, co-sponsored the legislation, the Javier Vega Jr. Memorial Act of 2017, along with U.S. Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas. U.S. Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, sponsored the legislation in the Senate.</p>
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<div data-refreshable="true" data-region="fixed-big-ad-middle-asset">“Agent Vega is remembered as a dedicated, loyal agent and U.S. Marine whose commitment to protecting our communities in South Texas should serve as an example to us all. By renaming this checkpoint we want to ensure that his faithful service to our nation will never be forgotten,” said McCaul, chairman of the Homeland Security Committee.</div>
<p>“Javier Vega dedicated himself to public service, and his sacrifice in defense of his country and his family will never be forgotten,” Vela said. “Our nation owes Mr. Vega and his family an immeasurable debt of gratitude.”</p>
<p>Yes we do.</p>Thu, 12 Oct 2017 00:00:00 -0400212https://vela.house.gov/media-center/in-the-news/editorial-renaming-border-checkpoint-after-fallen-agent-deserved-honorHouse Passes Legislation to Honor Fallen Officer Javier Vega, Jr.https://vela.house.gov/media-center/press-releases/house-passes-legislation-honor-fallen-officer-javier-vega-jr
<p><strong><em>Washington, DC</em></strong> - Yesterday, the House of Representatives passed legislation to name a Border Patrol checkpoint for fallen officer Javier Vega, Jr, a Border Patrol Agent who was shot and killed by two undocumented criminals while on a family fishing trip in Raymondville, Texas.</p>
<p>Border Patrol Agent Vega was a native of La Feria, Texas and a veteran who served in the United States Marine Corps. He was assigned to the Border Patrol station in Kingsville, Texas where he worked as a canine handler with his dog Goldie at the Sarita Checkpoint. </p>
<p>Congressmen Filemon Vela (D-Brownsville) and Michael McCaul (R-Austin) introduced H.R. 3375, The Javier Vega, Jr. Memorial Act of 2017, in the House and Senator John Cornyn (R-TX) in the Senate on July 24, 2017. The legislation renames the Border Patrol checkpoint where Agent Vega was assigned after him. </p>
<p>“Javier Vega dedicated himself to public service, and his sacrifice in defense of his country and his family will never be forgotten,” said Rep. Filemon Vela. “Our nation owes Mr. Vega and his family an immeasurable debt of gratitude.”</p>
<p>“Agent Vega’s heroism certainly merits this honor,” said Sen. John Cornyn. “In addition to donning his uniform to serve our nation every day, Agent Vega paid the ultimate sacrifice while defending his family and community. His death was tragic, but I’m grateful this bill will now head to the President’s desk so that all who pass through the Sarita checkpoint can recognize his service and sacrifice.”</p>
<p>“As Chairman of Homeland Security, I am proud of all of our Border Patrol Agents who put their lives on the line every day to protect our homeland and keep Americans safe,” said Rep. Michael McCaul. “Agent Vega is remembered as a dedicated, loyal agent and U.S. Marine whose commitment to protecting our communities in south Texas should serve as an example to us all. By renaming this checkpoint we want to ensure that his faithful service to our nation will never be forgotten.”</p>
<p>Agent Vega is survived by his wife, sons, parents, and brother, and his death in the line of duty has been deeply felt by countless friends, neighbors, and coworkers.</p>
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<p>In January 2018, contractors working for the Department of Homeland Security will begin to fulfill what Donald Trump has promised: building “a big, beautiful wall” that will separate the United States of America from Los Estados Unidos de Mexico. The path of least resistance to breaking ground on the first segment of the controversial border barrier runs through the Santa Ana Wildlife Refuge, 2,080 acres of richly biodiverse federal land on a meandering stretch of the Rio Grande in South Texas.</p>
<p><em><a href="https://washingtonspectator.org/dubose-potemkin/">This article was originally published at The Washington Spectator</a></em></p>
<p>What has played out in South Texas over the past several months is a prelude to Donald Trump’s larger wall-building project, as the DHS and U.S. Customs and Border Protection play fast and loose with the rules, and muscle anyone who gets in their way.</p>
<p>When site surveying began in the Santa Ana Wildlife Refuge (as first reported in <em>The Texas Observer</em> on July 14), DHS officials had not even filed applications for environmental waivers required to begin construction, a strategy critics described as a conscious attempt to keep the public in the dark. Nor did the department waste any time on cartography, opting instead to replicate maps created by Dannenbaum Engineering, a firm whose lavish contributions to elected officials responsible for approving contracts in South Texas have led to an ongoing investigation by the FBI.</p>
<p>There was no funding for the wall, as surveying proceeded, so Homeland Security officials explained that they were moving money around—most likely from $20 million in unallocated funds DHS announced it has on hand for the current fiscal year—until Congress passes an appropriations bill. But even the likelihood of funding was not assured. Rather than hold an up-or-down vote on $1.6 billion to start construction, House Republicans used a parliamentary tactic that automatically included that amount in the “Make America Secure Appropriations Act,” a four-bill “minibus” that includes defense appropriations.</p>
<p>All this occurred despite warnings from the Democratic leadership that bypassing a vote on funding the wall was unacceptable to the Senate Democratic Conference, which threatened to filibuster unless a discrete vote on the border wall was brought to the floor. But with Trump’s legislative agenda stalled, his approval rating in the low 30s, and every day another bad story about to break, even a small section of border wall would allow him to demonstrate to his base that he can deliver on a key campaign promise.</p>
<p>The administration in its desperation is effectively constructing a Potemkin wall, a showpiece built to hoodwink a public worried about border security. What critics describe as a “Trump vanity project” will be 2.9 miles of concrete and metal barrier connected to nothing—a freestanding wall on a levee in the middle of a 10-mile gap between two other existing short segments constructed after the Bush administration signed the Secure Fence Act in 2006.</p>
<p>“They are building it here because they can,” Scott Nicol, co-chair of the Sierra Club Borderlands Campaign, told me. Nicol has concluded that because the Trump administration feels the need build <em>something,</em> CPB has set its sights on the tractable Santa Ana National Wildlife Refuge. With the exception of the vast Big Bend National Park, 900 miles upriver, most land on the U.S. side of the border is privately owned. Securing right-of-way to build a fence through someone’s cow pasture, sorghum field, oil-and-gas lease, or backyard can take years. Here, on federally owned land, it can be only months.</p>
<p>There are already 110 miles of metal and concrete barrier scattered along the 1,200-mile Texas-Mexico border, built during the Bush and Obama administrations. But this particular section of wall will bisect one of the most biodiverse tracts of land along the Rio Grande. Often referred to as the “crown jewel of the national wildlife refuge system,” the Santa Ana Refuge is home to more than 400 species of birds, two endangered cats (the ocelot and the jaguarundi), and 450 plant species, including one of two rare stands of the threatened Sabal palm tree (the other is in a no-man’s-land behind a stretch of border wall miles downriver near Brownsville).</p>
<h4><b>Wrong Wall, Wrong Place</b></h4>
<p>Approximately 95 percent of anything that might remotely be described as wilderness on the Texas side of the Rio Grande is gone. The Santa Ana refuge was acquired by the federal government in 1943 as part of a string of wildlife sanctuaries along the border. It attracts tens of thousands of visitors each year, including thousands of birders from around the world.</p>
<p>At the heart of the park are four hiking trails that wend their way through mesquite and live oak trees draped with Spanish moss. Taking issue with building this wall in this wildlife sanctuary, <em>The Brownsville Herald</em> noted, “If the wall is built on the levee there, all four trails would be cut off behind the wall and only the visitors’ center and 50 feet of the refuge would be available.” And as a former Parks and Wildlife official told <em>The Texas Observer</em>: “It’s not just the wall, there’s also the cleared border enforcement zone around the wall, the roads, and the light towers.” To add further insult, the wall would shut off public access to La Lomita Chapel, a historic adobe sanctuary built by an order of Catholic priests in 1865.</p>
<p>South Texas, with more than a dozen small towns, a network of state highways, farm-to-market roads, ranch roads, and scores of county roads, has traditionally been a preferred route for undocumented immigrants entering the United States. Yet illegal entries have declined dramatically this year and are at a 17-year low, with 21,659 people turned away or detained at the U.S. ports of entry in June—less than half the number reported in June 2016.</p>
<p>The layout of the wildlife refuge already makes it easy for Border Patrol agents to police. There is a Border Patrol storefront office (which is often closed) at the Santa Ana visitor center. A perimeter road around the sanctuary, which also runs along the levee on which the wall will be built, provides access for Border Patrol agents.</p>
<p>If there were a need for a wall in the wildlife refuge, the regional or local Border Patrol sector chief would have made the case with senior officials in Washington, D.C. As it turns out, that dynamic was reversed. According to Scott Nicol, at a late-July closed-door meeting with stakeholders, Rio Grande Valley Border Patrol Sector Chief Manuel Padilla was asked if he had decided that a wall in the wildlife refuge is a priority. “Padilla paused,” Nicol said, “then Loren Flossman [the Director of the Border Patrol Facilities, who is based in Washington] said that he, in fact, had made the decision.”</p>
<p>Padilla, a 32-year veteran of the Border Patrol who grew up in Nogales, Ariz., was transferred to the Rio Grande Valley in 2015 with a mandate to replicate the success he had achieved in stemming the flow of undocumented border crossers and drugs while he was sector chief in Tucson.</p>
<p>Flossman is a retired Air Force colonel. He has also worked for Science Applications International Corporation, a Reston, Virginia, IT and technical services firm currently under a multiyear, multimillion-dollar contract with DHS. When I contacted him at his personal DHS email account to ask about the criteria he used to select the Santa Ana refuge as a high-priority site for a wall and about potential ethical conflicts related to his years spent at SAIC, Flossman referred me to a DHS public information email address, which does not function. He did not respond to subsequent queries sent to his personal DHS email address.</p>
<h4><b>“Shove the Wall Up Trump’s Ass”</b></h4>
<p>The three Democratic congressmen whose districts include the Texas-Mexico border oppose the wall; Republican Will Hurd, whose sprawling district includes 800 miles of the border but a negligible border population, supports it. (Hurd’s district includes a total of 67,000 residents living in border cities, while McAllen and Brownsville alone, the two largest border cities in the Lower Valley, have a combined population of 277,000.) But Hurd hedges his support, proposing an electronic virtual wall he claims will cost $500,000 a mile, compared to the $24.5 million per mile requested in the government’s 2018 fiscal year budget.</p>
<p>Perhaps by coincidence, construction of the first section of Trump’s border wall will begin in the congressional district of Democratic Representative Filemon Vela, who in 2016 released a letter he had written to then-candidate Donald Trump, in which the congressman wrote: “Mr. Trump, you’re a racist and you can take your border wall and shove it up your ass.” Vela would later tell MSNBC that he would have preferred to have spoken “in more diplomatic language,” but he believed he had to “speak to Donald Trump in language he understands.”</p>
<p>Vela was one of 16 members of the House Hispanic Caucus who signed on to a June 25, 2017, letter to House Rules Committee Chair Pete Sessions (D-Texas), objecting to the self-executing rule, “a legislative gimmick” House Republicans used to avoid “a clean up-or-down vote on [funding for] President Trump’s Border Wall.”</p>
<p>The Republican House leadership used the rule, rather than an amendment, to avoid a vote on the $1.6 billion tucked into the Defense appropriation minibus bill that was sent to the Senate. A spokesperson for Vela told me the Congressman voted against the defense appropriation bill in part because he strongly objected to the parliamentary maneuver used to force the $1.6 billion into the defense-spending bill—to begin construction on a wall he stridently opposes.</p>
<p>The $1.6 billion is a small, initial investment on a much larger project Trump insisted Mexico would pay for, even as he drastically underestimated what the wall will actually cost.</p>
<p>“It’s an easy decision for Mexico: make a one-time payment of $5–$10 billion to ensure that $24 billion [in remittances] continues to flow into their country year after year,” the Trump transition team wrote in a January 2016 memo. The memo also threatened to cut off (illegally) the money that documented and undocumented Mexicans living in the United States send to their families in Mexico.</p>
<p>Since then, Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto has not budged from his position that his country will not pay for a border wall. And estimates of the cost of building a wall along the 2,000-mile border have varied wildly, from Trump’s risible lowball to the price calculated by Senate Committee staffers.</p>
<p>Since threatening Mexico with a cutoff of remittances, Trump has said the wall will cost no more than $12 billion, and that he could build it for $10 billion. House Speaker Paul Ryan and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell predict it will cost $12 billion.</p>
<p>The U.S. Government Accountability Office estimates the wall will cost between $15 billion and $25 billion.</p>
<p>Hurd, while flogging his virtual-wall amendment that has yet to be adopted, said the wall will cost $33 billion. And the Democratic staff of the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee extrapolated the per-mile costs in Trump’s first request for funding and published an estimate of $69 billion.</p>
<p>Days later, Trump repeated to the Associated Press that he could build the wall for $10 billion—or less.</p>
<p>Who gets the numbers right? The Democratic Senate staff’s $69 billion is perhaps too high, but Trump’s $10 billion is laughable.</p>
<p>The research offices of the investment firm Alliance Bernstein took an apolitical look at material and labor costs. In a July 2016 “Materials Blast,” published for construction material suppliers and investors, it politely dismissed Trump’s $10 billion estimate.</p>
<p>“The costs to build the ‘easiest’ sections of the existing fence were between $2.8–3.9 million per mile according to the U.S. Government Accountability Office. However, given that these figures exclude labor costs, land acquisition costs and relate to construction in accessible areas with favorable construction conditions, the cost of Trump’s Wall is widely expected to be greater than $15 billion and perhaps as much as $25 billion.”</p>
<p>And as the wall will be built from precast concrete, Bernstein’s researchers surveyed aggregate suppliers along the border and predicted that the biggest two winners could be Mexican companies Cemex and GCG. Cemex has a slight edge because it has plants on both sides of the border.</p>
<p>So Trump’s wall-building project ironically could provide some economic stimulus for Mexico, perhaps even helping to reduce the flow of economic refugees looking for work in the United States.</p>
<p>The Bernstein report concludes:</p>
<p>“As ludicrous as the Trump Wall project sounds (to us at least), it represents a huge opportunity for those companies involved in its construction.”</p>
<p>Meanwhile, border residents brace for a return to the Bush years, when landowners either took what the federal government offered or faced eminent domain condemnation of their property, and the only metric that mattered was “mile count.”</p>
<p>It is a Bush-era law that makes this accelerated pace of wall-building possible. In 2005, California Republican Congressman Duncan Hunter, impatient with the slow progress of a wall project south of San Diego, managed to pass the broadest waiver of law in American history. Hunter’s amendment to the SAFE ID Act allows the Secretary of Homeland Security to waive more than 35 laws—including the National Environmental Policy Act, the Clean Air Act, the Endangered Species Act, the Clean Water Act, the Wilderness Act, and the National Wildlife Refuge System Administration Act—to advance a departmental agenda.</p>
<p>To add muscle to the process, the current minibus appropriation bill includes funding for an eminent domain strike force, a team of attorneys dedicated to seizing private property. (The bill also includes a “deportation strike force.”)</p>
<p>This is the president’s big set piece, as he made clear at his August 22 rally in Phoenix. “If we have to shut down that government, we’re building that wall,” Trump declared. “One way or another, we’re going to get that wall.”</p>
<p>What the dispassionate analysts at an investment firm characterized as “ludicrous” appears to be inevitable.</p>
<p><em>Lou Dubose is </em>The Washington Spectator’s<em> Senior Political Writer.</em></p>Fri, 06 Oct 2017 00:00:00 -0400212https://vela.house.gov/media-center/in-the-news/trump-s-attempt-build-border-wall-already-disaster-could-provide-economicThe Wall Makes Democrats the Property Rights, Fiscal Sanity Heroeshttps://vela.house.gov/media-center/in-the-news/wall-makes-democrats-property-rights-fiscal-sanity-heroes
<p class="speakable-p-1 p-text">The efforts of three U.S. House members to stop President Donald Trump's border wall have caused us to wonder who are the Democrats and who are the Republicans in this debate.</p>
<p class="speakable-p-2 p-text"><span class="exclude-from-newsgate"><strong>More: </strong><a href="http://www.caller.com/story/news/politics/border-issues/2017/10/04/democrats-bill-would-block-land-seizures-build-trumps-border-wall/728747001/">Democrats' bill would block land seizures to build Trump's border wall</a></span></p>
<p class="p-text">U.S. Reps. Ruben Gallego of Arizona, Beto O'Rourke of El Paso and Filemon Vela of Brownsville, all Democrats, are fighting for private property rights, fiscal responsibility and governing best by governing least. They are fighting against protectionism and a giant federal make-work boondoggle that makes Franklin Delano Roosevelt's Works Progress Administration and Civilian Conservation Corps look like a neighborhood pocket park.</p>
<p class="p-text">The late Adam Smith and William F. Buckley would be proud of them. Probably also Ronald Reagan and John Wayne. They'd be dismayed by Trump and his Republican enablers.</p>
<div class="story-asset image-asset" id="module-position-QZYwdGaSXA4"><img alt="Rep. Ruben Gallego" data-mycapture-sm-src="https://www.gannett-cdn.com/-mm-/a9504bd23c6952d902dfb3cc189a32ea2456a151/r=500x334/local/-/media/2017/05/08/Phoenix/Phoenix/636298041628554903-ruben.png" data-mycapture-src="https://www.gannett-cdn.com/media/2017/05/08/Phoenix/Phoenix/636298041628554903-ruben.png" height="405" itemprop="url" src="https://www.gannett-cdn.com/-mm-/6714816c145b2a4444accbeb9fd6dc4b898fe62e/c=102-0-925-619&amp;r=x408&amp;c=540x405/local/-/media/2017/05/08/Phoenix/Phoenix/636298041628554903-ruben.png" width="540" /><p>Rep. Ruben Gallego <span class="credit">(Photo: Gallego campaign)</span></p>
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<p class="p-text">Gallego and O'Rourke are sponsoring a bill called the Protecting the Property Rights of Border Landowners Act, a self-explanatory name. Vela is seeking to amend the heck out of the Border Security for America Act of 2017 in ways that would accomplish what his two border colleagues seek, plus requiring Trump to keep his impossible campaign promise of making Mexico pay for the wall before a U.S. nickel can be spent on it.</p>
<p class="p-text">Vela notes that the border security bill authorizes $10 billion for the wall "and does not even pretend to provide a way to pay for it." Shouldn't it?</p>
<div class="story-asset image-asset" id="module-position-QZYwdGava9c"><img alt="U.S. Rep. Filemon Vela" data-mycapture-sm-src="https://www.gannett-cdn.com/-mm-/917e93596c7d229ed6ed51ead659248e1256ac15/r=341x400/local/-/media/2016/12/30/TXGroup/CorpusChristi/636187124746045808-vela.jpg" data-mycapture-src="https://www.gannett-cdn.com/media/2016/12/30/TXGroup/CorpusChristi/636187124746045808-vela.jpg" height="240" itemprop="url" src="https://www.gannett-cdn.com/-mm-/ff633bcb234bca9cb569363a1aa9040f80cf4e78/c=9-0-143-179&amp;r=183&amp;c=0-0-180-240/local/-/media/2016/12/30/TXGroup/CorpusChristi/636187124746045808-vela.jpg" width="180" /><p>U.S. Rep. Filemon Vela <span class="credit">(Photo: Contributed Photo)</span></p>
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<p class="p-text">Vela also seeks:</p>
<ul><li>A $20 million fund to reimburse property owners for the expense of defending their land,</li>
<li>A requirement that Homeland Security exhaust all other alternatives to seizing land and provide evidence that none exists before exercising eminent domain, </li>
<li>And a definition of "border wall system." In addition to that elusive definition, members of Congress would have to answer "whether they agree with President Trump that the border wall should be a ‘big and beautiful, see-through, concrete, solar-generating, 700- to 900-mile-long wall.’"</li>
</ul><p class="p-text">It's a reasonable demand in the face of a reason-defying quest. "Big, beautiful wall" was an amusing campaign slogan that tens of millions of Americans didn't take seriously, as neither did Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto or former President Vicente Fox, because why would they? A 2,000-mile wall would be an incalculable expense, not to mention — as border representatives have on many occasions — a humanitarian, cultural and environmental hate crime.</p>
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<p class="p-text">Yet, since the election, the Republican majorities in both houses of Congress have been playing along with Trump as if there actually could be a tall, gleaming wall someday, all the way from Brownsville to the Pacific — paid for by Mexico. With several notable exceptions who provide endless Comedy Central sound bytes, deep down they all know better.</p>
<p class="p-text">Vela's proposed amendment is a demand that they face and embrace the absurdity of the proposal, eyes open. It's a public insult to them and to Trump, and therefore surely destined to be brushed aside. But they should thank Vela privately for offering the reset button that so desperately needs to be pushed collectively nationwide.</p>
<p class="p-text">Many of Trump's Republican critics challenge whether he's really one of them. The expense and overwhelmingly negative return on investment for a border wall make a strong case against him and anyone else who supports the wall idea being a Republican in anything other than name. They own it now, and they have forfeited the franchise on fiscal responsibility and commonsense government to Gallego, O'Rourke, Vela and other like-minded Democrats. </p>Fri, 06 Oct 2017 00:00:00 -0400212https://vela.house.gov/media-center/in-the-news/wall-makes-democrats-property-rights-fiscal-sanity-heroes